Welcome to Part Three of our WordPress Website Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to automate traffic to your site using the WordPress CMS.
In Part 1 of this article series, we provided an overview of the process, and explained why using an expertly configured WordPress website or blog is the key to generating automated traffic …
(With an expertly configured WordPress website, all you have to do to begin attracting more traffic is post web content on a consistent basis!)
In Part 2, we looked at the setup phase of the automation process. We helped you understand the best way to start if you don’t have a web presence yet, how to set everything up if you already have a website, and what to do if your site was built using WordPress.
(In Part two we show you where to set up a WordPress website or blog on your domain)
In this section of the series, we look at the configuration phase of the traffic automation process. We will show you how a WordPress site should be configured in order to get new traffic automatically as you begin publishing new content on your web site.
WordPress Web Traffic System – Configuration Phase
Being able to drive more traffic to one’s website is often cited by most website owners as one of the greatest challenges they face online. With business becoming increasingly more competitive on a global scale, it’s worth learning about any opportunity you can to increase your own competitiveness online.
Having the ability to generate traffic on demand can provide you with a tremendous advantage over other competitors. For WordPress users, having an expertly configured website means having an immediate advantage from the word “go”.
Configuration Is The Difference
There is a significant difference between an expertly configured WordPress site and a site that has been professionally set up by a website-building expert but not necessarily configured to its fullest advantage.
Here is a simple way to explain the differences:
An expertly configured WordPress website gives you a professional web presence plus online business marketing automation!
(An expertly configured website gives you a professional web presence with an automated online business marketing tool!)
Not only are more steps needed to build and integrate an automated online business marketing process into your website, but also a special kind of expertise.
Allow me to illustrate this point with a story.
Ludicrous Or Fair? You Decide …
Things are going just fine in the gizmo assembly workshop when everything suddenly comes to a stop.
As no one can figure out what’s happened, the manager decides to call in an expert to try and fix the problem.
Soon afterward, the expert arrives and, without uttering a word, immediately goes towards the control box. After staring at the electronic components for no more than 5 minutes or so, the expert then takes out a teeny-weeny little hammer from his pocket and makes a very gentle tap about 2 cm from the bottom-left edge of the unit.
Immediately, everything springs back to life.
The floor manager is filled with joy as he thanks the expert, who leaves just as quickly as he had arrived.
A couple of days later, the factory manager receives a bill for $5,000.
Angry and confused, the manager calls the expert. Why did he charge them such a ridiculously high fee for less than 5 minutes work? He promptly requests an itemized invoice and hangs up.
The next day, an invoice arrives on the manager’s desk. Upon opening it, this is what he sees:
The #1 challenge most businesses face online is being able to consistently drive new traffic to their sites.
In the above story, how much money did the factory stand to lose when the equipment stopped functioning and no one in the factory floor had the expertise required to get things up and running again? Did the expert not have every right to ask to be compensated fairly for spending years developing the knowledge, skills and expertise that allowed him to quickly assess and repair a potentially costly problem?
Similarly, if you could have a WP blog fully set up and configured so all you ever had to do is publish content to it and search engines, social sites and dozens of other web properties would be automatically notified, how much time and money would this save you?
(How much time and money would you save if you could automate the process of attracting new visitors to your site?)
While experts often make complicated situations and problems look simple, it rarely turns out to be that way.
Knowing how to expertly configure a WordPress site requires more than adding some pages with content and configuring some basic settings. It involves knowing where to tap! This includes knowing things such as:
- Which plugins need to be installed to get specific functionalities on your site.
- Which accounts you need to set up and activate to achieve specific outcomes
- Which options you need to configure in order to make sure processes will run as expected, etc.
(Driving traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires expertise)
This stage of the WordPress traffic automation system is not so technically challenging, but it’s quite complicated. It’s not as easy as installing and configuring a piece of software, clicking a button … it’s all of this and much more.
The configuration stage is a complex process that involves your server, your website or blog, and a number of external sites and services …
(The configuration phase involves more than just configuring a few settings in WordPress)
If the activities involved in the configuration process were to be flowcharted, it would look something like this …
(A simplistic diagram showing the activities involved in the configuration process)
Let’s take a look at what’s involved in more detail.
Web Hosting
We’re not talking about the process of configuring your web hosting account for installation purposes (this should have been done during the Setup phase). What we are talking about, is configuring settings in your webhosting account that affect how your site will handle all web traffic …
(During the configuration phase, your server settings need to be checked for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all traffic is welcome traffic. Some of the web traffic your site can attract will be unwelcome traffic like spam, security threats, brute-force bot attacks, etc.
This aspect of the configuration process, therefore, requires planning for bad and good traffic and then adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This could include things like implementing server-level spam protection and threat prevention, to configuring your domain and email redirections, etc …
(Have you configured your hosting control panel settings for handling things like emails, page errors, etc?)
Once your server settings have been fine-tuned and configured, the next step is to configure various external sites and services.
Configuring External Sites
The purpose of choosing external sites is that all content should be posted to a central location (your site) and from there, it will get syndicated automatically to other parts of your web traffic generation system, or notify traffic-related web properties and services.
After adding these external sites to your traffic network, content pointing back to your site will get automatically added to search, social and aggregator sites. Your content and business will benefit from exposure online, helping your business tap into new sources of traffic.
Some of these external web properties and online services will need to be set up before configuring your WordPress site to help save time and some will need to be done later, during the automation phase.
For example, you will want to set up the following accounts:
Google Search Console
(Google Webmaster Tools – create a Google-friendly website or blog)
Google Webmasters lets you inform Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for automatic page indexing, and provides you with useful data, SEO tools and reports about your website.
Once your account and site data with Google Webmaster Tools are set up, this information can be used to automate web traffic-related settings in WordPress and other applications.
Google Analytics
(Google Analytics)
Google Analytics lets you improve your website’s results, SEO, marketing efforts, and more, by tracking all user behaviour, pages visited, keywords searched for, organic referrals, etc.
After setting up your Google Analytics account and site data, you can add visitor tracking information to WordPress via a simple plugin and send data instantly to other online applications and reporting tools.
Bing Data And Tools
(Drive more traffic with Bing Webmaster Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Search Console. After setting up your account, you can use this information to automate web traffic-related settings in WordPress and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As explained in Part Two, WordPress offers website owners the option of a hosted vs self-hosted website. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress version if you are planning to build a professional web presence.
WordPress.com (the hosted option), however, provides a number of useful tools, which can be accessed by various WordPress plugins. We recommend setting up an account with WordPress.com, therefore, and we’ll explain how to integrate this into your traffic generation system in Part 4 of this article series.
Social Media And Social Bookmarking Sites
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and drive new visitors to your site)
You will need your various social media and social bookmarking accounts set up in order to configure these as part of your traffic generation system.
After setting up and configuring everything, you will be able to syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and bring new traffic to your site.
You should have profiles with all of the main social networks – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Pinterest, etc.
There are many social bookmarking sites you can set up. You don’t need to create accounts with all of them, just pick the ones that will work with your setup and/or content sharing tools.
(There are lots of social sites you can syndicate your content to. Image source ShareThis.com)
Additional Platforms, Content Aggregators, Etc.
There are many emerging platforms and RSS aggregators that can serve as secondary traffic generation sources. Some are free or provide free plans, and some are paid services.
For example, here is a content aggregator site that allows you to add your WordPress site feed …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse)
RebelMouse is an aggregator for your social profiles and RSS feeds. Your content displays in a Pinterest-like format and visitors can follow your own RebelMouse website.
There are many different platforms you can add to your own traffic blueprint. Please feel free to contact us if you would like to explore this area further and discuss a configuration plan to suit your needs.
After you have configured your web server and set up accounts with external services, it’s time to configure your site’s settings.
WordPress Site Configuration
The first step in configuring your site for traffic is to ensure that your global settings have been set up correctly.
Let’s go over some key areas.
WordPress Settings
By default, WordPress includes a Settings section that allows you to set up your site’s main settings …
(WordPress admin menu – Settings)
General Settings
Fields like Site Title and Tagline can influence your site’s SEO, search results, etc …
(Global Settings – General Settings Screen)
Writing
The Writing Settings section contains a powerful and often overlooked automated traffic notification system …
(WordPress Settings – Writing Settings)
As described in this section,
When you publish a new post, WordPress automatically notifies the following site update services …
Unless you have specifically chosen to prevent search engines from indexing your site – see next section, then your site will automatically ping the update services entered into the Update Services text box
By default, when WordPress is installed, only one service is listed …
(Update Services)
You can notify dozens of update services automatically – just add a list containing all of the update services you want notified to this section …
(WordPress lets you notify dozens of update services automatically!)
Download A Comprehensive List Of Ping Services For Your WordPress Site!
Click the link below to download a comprehensive list of reliable and authoritative ping services for your WordPress site or blog:
Download A List Of Ping Services For Your WordPress Site
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Note: If you need help setting up the list of ping services on your site, we recommend using a professional web services provider. You can find professional WordPress service providers in our WordPress Services Directory.
Reading Settings
This section affects how your content gets seen by readers when they visit your home page and blog pages.
The syndication settings on this page can influence traffic. For example, choosing to display the full content vs a summary of your post, affects how your content displays in RSS feeds and RSS email campaigns, and could impact someone’s choice to explore your content further, and whether or not they will visit your site to get the rest of the content from summaries, or read the content in full without the need to click through to your site.
As far as traffic is concerned, however, the most important setting here is whether the Search Engine Visibility checkbox is ticked or not.
Typically, you would want search engines to visit your site. Leaving the box unchecked enables your site to ping the list of update services whenever a new post gets published (see Writing Settings above). Unless you have a specific reason why search engines should not visit your site, do not check this box …
(WordPress Settings – Reading Settings)
Discussion
Although the settings in this section are mostly concerned with how users engage with content on your site, you have the option to allow notifications to sites linked to from your content, and to allow link notifications from other blogs (pingbacks and trackbacks). This can work for you, but it can also drive bad traffic in the form of SPAM comments …
(Settings Menu – Discussion Settings Section)
Permalink Settings
Permalinks allow you to create SEO-friendly URLs …
(WordPress Settings – Permalink Settings Screen)
Here are some of the ways search-friendly URLS can be configured …
(Configuring permalink URLs)
We have written a detailed tutorial about using WP permalinks here: How To Configure WordPress Permalinks
Configuring WordPress Plugin Settings
WordPress provides users with thousands of plugins that can add almost every type of functionality imaginable to your site, including traffic generation.
Let’s look at examples of plugin categories and plugins that can improve traffic generation
WordPress Security Plugins – Blog Defender
Once again, it’s important to configure your website for handling both good traffic and bad traffic. No blog is guaranteed immunity from a cyber-attack.
(WordPress Security Plugins help prevent bad traffic from causing your website harm)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your blog invisible to bot and hacker attacks.
More information:
SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
SEO plugins help drive more traffic by making your web content easily indexable …
(Yoast SEO – WordPress SEO Plugin)
A plugin like Yoast SEO (previously known as WordPress SEO by Yoast) can significantly improve your website’s search engine optimization. When properly configured, this plugin not only makes your site easier for search engines to find, crawl and index, it also lets you specify how to present your content to Google’s search results and social media sites Facebook, Twitter, and GooglePlus.
Social Sharing Plugins
Allowing visitors to easily share your content with their own friends and networks can help to increase traffic to your site, especially if your site provides content that adds value to readers.
(WordPress users can easily add social sharing buttons to their site using free or inexpensive WordPress plugins)
WordPress users can easily add social features to their site with free or inexpensive WordPress plugins.
Many social share plugins allow you to select which sites your content can be shared to, embed social buttons into your content, set up default notifications, display/hide share counters (e.g. number of shares), etc. Some plugins even allow you to ‘lock’ content which users can unlock by liking your page.
Configuring WordPress Theme Settings For Traffic Generation
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that can help improve your site’s traffic generation capabilities.
For example, as well as options and settings for configuring the layout and design of your website, some themes also provide built-in features that let you improve SEO and site linking structure for faster indexing, add tracking snippets, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many WordPress themes like Graphene (a free theme) come with built-in traffic optimization features)
With a number of quality themes, adding social sharing buttons and features to your website is as easy as clicking a button …
(Many WordPress themes provide built-in social sharing features that can be easily enabled on with the click of a button)
Other Areas To Configure For Better Traffic Results
Last (but by no means least) in the configuration process, are the areas that need to be set up outside of the global settings.
This includes the following:
Legal Pages
Once again, when preparing your website for an increase in traffic, it’s important to plan not only how to handle bad and good traffic but also for all the situations that can hurt your business when more and more people begin to visit your website.
If you engage in any form of commercial activity online, it’s important that your website remains compliant with legal requirements of government agencies that regulate business practices online.
(Is Your Website Or Blog Compliant?)
For a detailed article about the importance of having a legally compliant website, see this article:
Post Tags And Post Categories
WordPress tags & post categories help search engines index your website, which helps to increase traffic.
(Categories help improve traffic by allowing search engines to better understand and index your website.)
As we strongly recommend in this article, your site’s post tags and post categories should be reviewed and set up earlier on, during the Website Planning Stage.
When configuring your site to automate and improve web traffic, you will want to review and make sure that the post categories and tags you have set up.
Visitor Site Map
A site map that lists all of your site’s pages and posts is not only a useful navigation tool, it can also help external tools discover more of your online content …
(A site map is not just great for visitors, but for web traffic too!)
Note: An HTML site map and an XML sitemap are different things. HTML site maps provide visitors with a visual map of how your content is structured, whereas XML sitemaps are mostly filled with code that only search engine bots can interpret. Although Google will index your pages just from an XML sitemap (which plugins like Yoast SEO will create for you – see earlier section), allowing visitors to find more pages on your site results in increased traffic.
404 Error Page – Don’t Forget To Configure It!
When visitors enter the wrong URL into their browser or click on a dead hyperlink, they will normally be presented with an error page …
(A 404 Error Page)
A 404 Not Found page can be configured to funnel traffic to your functional pages …
(Configuring your 404 page allows you to redirect web traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 page can be set up on your web server, there are several plugins for WordPress that let you easily configure your 404 page inside your WordPress dashboard.
WordPress Traffic Automation System: Configuration Process – Summary
Once your WordPress site has been expertly configured and fully set up, all you need to do to automatically drive traffic is publish content consistently.
The process of expertly configuring your WordPress site, however, can be quite involved and elaborate and requires the configuration and integration of a number of different elements and external web properties …
(Traffic System – Configuration Phase Checklist)
The skills and knowledge required to perform this process can take many website professionals months to acquire.
Once you have configured your WordPress site, the next step is to automate the process. This step is covered in the next article in the series.
This is the end of Section 3
To read more, click on the link below:
This tutorial is part of a comprehensive series of tutorials aimed at helping business owners learn how to grow their business online cost-effectively with a WordPress-powered website and proven marketing methods that are easy to implement.
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